Elisabeth "Betsy" DeVos (née Prince; born January 8, 1958) is an American billionaire,[1] businesswoman, philanthropist, and education activist from Michigan. DeVos is known for her advocacy of school choice and voucher programs. DeVos is married to Dick DeVos, an heir to the Amway fortune.

Early life and education[edit]

Elisabeth DeVos was born Elisabeth Prince on January 8, 1958.[3][4] She grew up in Holland, Michigan, the daughter of Elsa (Zwiep) Prince (later, Broekhuizen) and Edgar Prince, an industrialist[5][6] of Dutch ancestry.[7] Edgar was the founder of Prince Corporation, an automobile parts supplier based in Holland, Michigan, which at one time employed almost one-quarter of the town's population.[5] DeVos' brother, Erik Prince, founded Blackwater USA, a private security firm which had operations in Iraq.[5]

Political activity[edit]

From 1982 onward, DeVos participated in the Michigan Republican Party, including serving as a local precinct delegate. She was a Republican National Committeewoman for Michigan between 1992 and 1997,[9] and served as chairwoman of the Michigan Republican Party from 1996 to 2000.[10][11] In 2004, the Lansing State Journal described DeVos as "a political pit bull for most of [Gov. Jennifer] Granholm's 16 months in office, and said that if DeVos wasn't Granholm's "worst nightmare," she was "certainly her most persistent." Bill Ballenger, editor of the newsletter Inside Michigan Politics and a former Republican state senator, called DeVos "a good behind-the-scenes organizer and a good fund raiser" as well as "a true believer in core Republican issues that leave nobody in doubt on where she stands."[12]

DeVos resigned the position in 2000. She said in 2000, "It is clear I have never been a rubber stamp... I have been a fighter for the grassroots, and following is admittedly not my strong suit." [13] In 2003, DeVos ran again for party chairman and was elected to the post without opposition.[13]

A press release issued by DeVos in April 2004 blamed Michigan's economic woes on "high wages and a tax and regulatory structure that makes this state uncompetitive" leading to a backlash from members of the Michigan public who disagreed with DeVos that workers were overpaid.[14]

DeVos raised more than $150,000 for the 2004 Bush re-election campaign,[15] and hosted a Republican fundraiser at her home in October 2008 that was headlined by President George W. Bush.[16] During the Bush Administration she spent two years as the finance chairman for the National Republican Senatorial Committee and worked closely with the Administration on "various projects."[17]

On November 23, 2016, it was announced she was President-elect Trump's choice to be the next United States Secretary of Education.[18] The announcement was praised by conservative school choice advocates, with Jeb Bush calling her an "outstanding pick."[19]Randi Weingarten called her "the most ideological, anti-public education nominee" since the position became a cabinet position.[19]

Business career[edit]

DeVos is chairwoman of the Windquest Group, a privately held operating group that invests in technology, manufacturing, and clean energy. DeVos and her husband founded it in 1989.[8]

In 2011, DeVos and her husband, via the Windquest Group, invested in Energetx Composites, a wind energy company. They were drawn to it because it aligned with Windquest Group's clean energy focus. Windquest also invested in another Western Michigan firm, Cascade Engineering, to create a water filter used to help clean water efforts.[20][21][22]

Non-profit work[edit]

Dick & Betsy DeVos Family Foundation[edit]

The Dick & Betsy DeVos Family Foundation was launched in 1989.[23] The foundation's giving, according to its website, is motivated by faith, and "is centered in cultivating leadership, accelerating transformation and leveraging support in five areas", namely education, community, arts, justice, and leadership.[24]

Arts[edit]

Kennedy Center[edit]

DeVos was appointed by President George W. Bush to the board of directors of the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in 2004, and served until 2010. While she was on the board, she and her husband funded a center to teach arts managers and boards of directors how to fundraise and manage their cultural institutions.[25][26] The couple donated $22.5 million in 2010 to continue the endeavor, which was given in the name the DeVos Institute of Arts Management.[25][26]

After the announcement of the DeVoses' gift to the Kennedy Center, DeVos explained that she had been persuaded by Kennedy Center official Michael Kaiser's observation that millions of dollars are invested "in the arts, and training artists," but not in "training the leaders who hire the artists and run the organizations." The DeVoses' gift was intended to remedy this oversight. "We want to help develop human capital and leverage that capital to the greatest extent possible," she said, describing Kaiser's "practice and approach" as "practical, realistic and creative."[26] The DeVoses' gift, part of which would be spent on arts groups in Michigan that had been hit hard by the recession, was the largest private donation in the Kennedy Center's history.[27]

ArtPrize[edit]

In 2009, DeVos and her family founded ArtPrize, an international art competition held in Grand Rapids, Michigan.[28]

Education[edit]

School Vouchers[edit]

DeVos is known as a "a fierce proponent of school vouchers" that would allow students to attend private schools with public funding.[29] According to The New York Times, it "is hard to find anyone more passionate about the idea of steering public dollars away from traditional public schools than Betsy DeVos."[19]

DeVos served as chairwoman of the board of Alliance for School Choice[31] She heads the All Children Matter PAC which she and her husband founded in 2003 to promote school vouchers, tax credits to businesses that give private school scholarships, and candidates who support these causes.[32][33] Over the years, DeVos and her husband have provided millions in funding for the organization.[34]

Her other activities on behalf of public-school reform have included membership on the boards of directors of the Advocates for School Choice, the American Education Reform Council, and the Education Freedom Fund.[35] She has chaired the boards of Choices for Children, and Great Lakes Education Project (GLEP).[36]

DeVos is Chair of the American Federation for Children (AFC), which describes itself as "a leading national advocacy organization promoting school choice, with a specific focus on advocating for school vouchers and scholarship tax credit programs." It is affiliated with the Alliance for School Choice.[37]

During the 1990s, she served on the boards of Children First America and the American Education Reform Council, which sought to expand school choice through vouchers and tax credits. She and her husband worked for the successful passage of Michigan's first charter-school bill in 1993, and for the unsuccessful effort in 2000 to amend Michigan's constitution to allow tax-credit scholarships or vouchers. In response to that defeat, DeVos started a PAC, the Great Lakes Education Project, which championed charter schools. DeVos's husband and John Walton then founded All Children Matter, a political organization, which she chaired. [38]

Detroit charter school system[edit]

DeVoe was one of the architects of the Detroit charter school system. Douglas N. Harris, professor of Economics at Tulane University, wrote in a New York Times op-ed that DeVos was partly responsible for "what even charter advocates acknowledge is the biggest school reform disaster in the country." In the National Assessment of Educational Progress, Detroit had the lowest reading and mathematics scores "by far" over any city participating in the evaluation. She designed a system with no oversight, said Harris, and where schools that do poorly can still continue to enroll students.[39]

Grading system[edit]

DeVos and Joel Klein said in a May 2013 op-ed that residents of Maine "are now given information on school performance using easy-to-understand report cards with the same A, B, C, D and F designations used in student grades." This system, they argued, "truly motivates parents and the community to get involved by simply taking information that education officials have had for years and presenting it in a way that is more easily understood."[40]

The DeVoses have also established an annual scholarship, called the Betsy and Dick DeVos Scholars for Free Enterprise and Entrepreneurship Scholarship, which is awarded to students earning a BBA or combined BBA/MBA at Northwood University.[41]

Foundation for Excellence in Education[edit]

DeVos is a member of the board of the Foundation for Excellence in Education (ExcelinEd),[42], a think tank founded by Jeb Bush whose stated goal is to "build an American education system that equips every child to achieve his or her God-given potential." Its vision is: "An education system that maximizes every student's potential for learning and prepares all students for success in the 21st century." And its "guiding principles" are that "All children can learn," that "All children should learn at least a year's worth of knowledge in a year's time", and that "All children will achieve when education is organized around the singular goal of student success."[43]

In a press release at the time of their donation, in 2013, to the Kennedy Center for the creation of the DeVos Institute of Arts Management, it was reported that the couple have two daughters and two sons.[45][better source needed][46] One son, Rick, works for the Windquest Group (of which his mother is the chairperson) as a consultant on urban development.[47] They own residences in Grand Rapids and Ada in Michigan;[28] Windsor, a community in Vero Beach, Florida;[48][49] and a home on Lake Macatawa, in Holland, Michigan.[50] They also own a yacht.[28]

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